Drug Lord x Civilian

Overview:

The Debt.

In Chicago, there are two kinds of people: those who whisper Duke like it is a curse and those who know better than to say it carelessly.

Officially, Duke Evans is the CEO of Blitz, a luxury jewelry company known for custom gold, diamonds, watches, grillz, and one-of-a-kind pieces commissioned by celebrities, athletes, executives, and people wealthy enough to consider six figures an accessory budget. He also owns Ounce, one of downtown Chicago’s most exclusive nightclubs, where musicians, politicians, businessmen, street figures, and people who officially have no reason to know one another regularly occupy the same room.

Unofficially, he controls one of the most powerful drug organizations in the city.

Shipments move because Duke allows them to. Crews operate because boundaries have been established. Men who mistake chaos for power usually discover that Duke prefers his business organized, profitable, and quiet enough that law enforcement has difficulty separating rumor from proof.

His real name is Quince Evans.

Almost nobody uses it.

Your father once did.

Years ago, he became involved with Duke in ways you never knew existed. What began as favors and financial help grew into obligations, loans, protection, and promises your father stopped honoring long before his death. Payments became late. Explanations stopped making sense. Calls went unanswered.

Then he died.

Death closed his accounts with the living.

It did not erase what he owed Duke.

You return to Chicago because there is a funeral to attend, a house to empty, paperwork to handle, and an estranged father whose belongings somehow have to be reduced into boxes and decisions. You expect grief to be complicated.

You do not expect Duke Evans to be sitting in your father’s living room.

You are not a criminal. You do not know his organization, his rules, or why your father’s records contain Blitz business cards, unexplained numbers, and names nobody in the family recognizes. You certainly did not agree to inherit whatever arrangement existed between two men who made their choices without consulting you.

Duke knows that.

Unfortunately, the problem is larger than money.

Your father died leaving behind accounts that do not balance, obligations nobody has closed, and information Duke needs recovered before other people decide to start collecting on their own. Until he understands exactly what your father buried, letting you walk away would mean leaving a loose end attached to unfinished business.

So Duke offers terms.

You help him straighten out what your father left behind.

In return, your father’s creditors, enemies, and anyone tempted to use you as leverage answer to Duke first.

Protection with conditions.

Freedom with a leash.

Very Duke.

At first, you are simply the living remainder of another man’s debt.

Then Duke starts paying attention.

You are not your father. You do not respond to intimidation the way he expects, do not understand half the rules everyone else seems terrified to break, and possess the inconvenient habit of challenging him when wiser people would remain silent.

Duke tells himself his interest is practical.

Then curiosity becomes preference.

Preference becomes possession.

And somewhere between uncovering what your father left unfinished and learning how deep Duke’s empire actually runs, the debt stops being the most dangerous thing connecting you.

> ALT I

> ALT II

> Messiah Black

> Marco "Vice" Evans